Samsonov advances at ITTF World Tour Platinum Qatar Open

DOHA, March 5, 2020 - Vladimir Samsonov fought off France's Alexandre Cassin by winning 4-1 (9-11, 11-7, 11-6, 11-4, 11-3) at the 2020 ITTF World Tour Platinum Qatar Open singles round 2 qualifier here on Wednesday.​​​The Belarussian registered more points on Cassin's serve and showcased his calmness to dictate the outcome of the match.“There are many possible reasons I won after today's match. Of course after Hungary we tried to find out why we lost and prepared better. Could also be that he didn't play as well today and I played better. Overall it was still not an easy match," said Samsonov, who had won the title here in 2003 and 2015 respectively.India's Sathiyan Gnanasekaran used his experience to the maximum against Japan's latest prodigious teenager Shunsuke Togami to win 4-1 (11-3, 7-11, 11-9, 11-4, 11-8).On table 2, it was a battle between two experienced athletes – where Spain's Alvaro Robles' came out on top against Hungary's Bence Majoros in a brilliant 4-2 (8-11, 11-9, 7-11, 11-3, 11-6, 11-3) win.England's Paul Drinkhall and Liam Pitchford fought back after 0-2 down to beat Serbian opponents Marko Jevtovic and Zsolt Peto 3-2 (10-12, 7-11, 11-9, 11-8, 11-5) at the 2020 ITTF World Tour Platinum Qatar Open doubles qualifier here on Wednesday. But there was victory for another Serbian pair as Aleksandar Karakasevic and Lubomir Pistej came out on top against India's Harmeet Desai and Sushmit Sriram (9-11, 16-14, 8-11, 11-5, 11-6).In the women's doubles Preliminary Round 1, Denmark's Stefanie Christensen and Belgium's Nathalie Marchetti secured their place in the main event, recovering from 1-2 down to beat India's Sreeja Akula and Madhurika Patkar 3-2 (11-8, 7-11, 7-11, 11-6, 11-7).China's reigning world champion Liu Shiwen has withdrawn from the competition due to injury as the main draw starts on Thursday.Originally she was the no.4 seed in the women's singles event, the top seed in the mixed doubles partnering colleague Xu Xin.

Global Champions Tour at Al Shaqab begins on Thursday

DOHA, MARCH 04, 2020 - The 2020 Longines Global Champions Tour and GCL were officially declared open Tuesday in Doha as top rider Nicola Philippaerts and local organisers hailed the 'amazing, prestigious' circuit and predicted an epic battle for the individual and team titles. Al Shaqab is the launchpad for the new season with 50 riders from 15 different countries heading to Qatar's capital city from tomorrow till Saturday to take part in these high-stakes competitions under the stunning soaring architecture of the Longines Arena at Al Shaqab. The best riders in the world are in attendance, including 9 of the top 10 riders from the LGCT overall season ranking at the Finals in 2019, setting the scene for an electrifying weekend of sport.Last season saw a stunning finish as French rider Julien Epaillard snatched the win from 2019 LGCT Champion and LGCT Super Grand Prix winner Ben Maher of Britain. Epaillard, who won three events at the CHI Al Shaqab last weekend, returns to defend his title this year, and will compete against stars including Scott Brash (Britain), Pieter Devos (Belgium), Maikel van der Vleuten (the Netherlands), Simon Delestre (France), Daniel Deusser (Germany), Hans-Dieter Dreher (Germany) and Peder Fredricson (Sweden) in a bid for glory at this early stage of the season.Seven Qatari showjumpers – Faleh Suwead al-Ajami, Salman Mohamed al-Emadi, Rashid Towaim Ali al-Marri, Sultan Rashid al-Marri, Mohamed Nasser al-Qadi, Saeed Nasser al-Qadi and Mubarak Yousuf al-Rumaihi – will also be in action. Omar al-Mannai, Commercial Manager of AL Shaqab and Event Director, spoke of the importance of hosting this opening leg. “Longines Global Champions Tour started in Doha in 2008, then in 2013 we started hosting LGCT here in Al Shaqab. LGCT is a tour that takes place all over the world, and of course it has boosted the sport all around the world. For us here in Doha, it's incredible for riders, trainers, and so on to experience this kind of event. Besides that, the top sport of LGCT continues to attract new partners - local and international - to be part of this story here in Qatar and this is important for us as organisers and hosts. We now have almost 40,000 spectators attending over three days so we have really developed the event in that way too. We are looking forward to continue hosting this event in the future," al-Mannai said.He also spoke of the objective to encourage a new generation in show jumping at the Kids' Academy at Al Shaqab, building on the sport's growing popularity in Qatar, and praised young riders who are inspired by watching and learning from the top riders in action at the event. Nicola Philippaerts of Belgium, one of the world's top riders and a member of the London Knights GCL team, said: “It is an amazing circuit and all the best riders in the world do it. Everyone wants to win the title in the end. The top riders in the world are all here and we will see some nice sport this weekend". Philippaerts will be one to watch this season, and he brings some talented horses to the competition this weekend including Katanga, who placed fifth in the Grand Prix at last week's CHI event at Al Shaqab. The Belgian rider was impressed with the facilities for horses, riders, grooms, owners and spectators at Shaqab. “For us as riders it's an incredible place, we always look forward to coming back here. I think the best riders in the world have been coming already for many years here, the top 30 almost always come here. The weather is good, the facilities are perfect, all the riders come here with their best horses. The event and venue is good preparation for this year's Olympic Games as the weather and temperature is good for the horses' acclimatisation, and there is a lot of space to work everywhere," Philippaerts said.LGCT and GCL President and Founder, Jan Tops spoke of the huge anticipation among fans around the world for the kick-off event of the season, and of the ever-increasing following that the tour has amassed. “I think Al Shaqab is a unique place in the world, I don't think there is a second place like this, they really think of everything. The public attendance is increasing every year, which is very nice to see. The whole place is picture perfect. We are excited to see all the teams battle for their places for the title and also the riders to try and qualify all season for the LGCT Super Grand Prix in Prague which is very prestigious to win," Tops said.The tour has grown from strength to strength since its inception in 2006, increasing from 6 events to this year's calendar of 18 events including the GC Prague Playoffs, spanning 3 continents and 18 iconic locations around the world. The first round of the GCL team competition will begin at 5:45pm tomorrow, with home team Doha Falcons looking for a good start. Friday will see two top-level competitions, before the second round of the GCL competition takes place at 2:45pm on Saturday. The LGCT Grand Prix of Doha kicks off at 6:15pm on Saturday, with riders vying for the win as well as the first golden ticket to the LGCT Super Grand Prix at the GC Prague Playoffs.

Strong field sets the stage for thrilling action at ECGC

DOHA, MARCH 4, 2020 - The 2020 Commercial Bank Qatar Masters has an “exciting" field in its 23nd edition, with several past champions and many upcoming stars lining up at the newest golf course on the European Tour, the Education City Golf Club (ECGC).The 144-player field at the popular European Tour tournament is headed by two-time major winner Martin Kaymer, former Open champion and two-time champion in Doha Paul Lawrie, defending champion Justin Harding from South Africa along with former champions Jeunghun Wang from South Korea, Spain's Alvaro Quiros and South Korean Darren Fichardt.“It's a very exciting field this week. It's a strong field having a lot of past winners with upcoming stars," European Tour tournament director Mikael Ericsson said at a pre-event press conference yesterday.The $1.75mn event is being held from March 5-8 for the famous Mother of Pearl Trophy at the new venue where the conditions will be challenging.|“It's a great course, but it will be a tough task for the players this week as it will be pretty windy on the first day and we will make it more challenging with tough pin placements and firmer, faster greens," Ericsson said.The event has moved across the Qatari capital from Doha Golf Club for the first time in its 23-year history to Education City Golf Club — a landmark project for Qatar — which offers a revolutionary and holistic approach to growing the game.Designed by two-time Masters Champion Jose Maria Olazabal, the venue at Education City comprises of 33 holes split into three courses; 18 holes, nine holes and six holes. The exciting new venue expects to not only challenge the European Tour stars but to entertain local and international spectators with its unique views of the Doha skyline and the 2022 Education City World Cup Stadium.The highly-anticipated event is organised by Qatar Golf Association (QGA), the Qatar Olympic Committee (QOC), Education City Golf Club and long-term title sponsor, Commercial Bank.Commercial Bank's EGM, Chief Marketing Officer, Hussein al-Abdulla said they have been supporting the tournament keeping Qatar National Vision 2030 in mind.“We have been reaching out to school students through our campaign. We have been supporting Qatar National Vision 2030, which basically aims to spread sport and education. We have done a lot of education awareness among the schools, malls, social media," said al-Abdulla.“Every year, Commercial Bank tirelessly works to deliver the best golf experience for participants and players, as well as spectators and enthusiasts, which is why we have organised and scheduled in cooperation with the Education City Golf Club visits to various schools and universities in Doha to raise awareness on this sport amongst students. “The main goal of this campaign was to raise awareness about this fascinating game and to educate the public in Qatar, in particular community members aged between three and 25, in order to make them more familiar with the game, its techniques and values. We are pleased to announce that we have succeeded in educating around 9,000 students from several schools and universities in the country," he said.“This year marks the forty-fifth anniversary of the Commercial Bank, in addition to being the fifteenth year of the bank organising the Qatar Masters tournament. The bank's organisation of this tournament as the title sponsor is a solid indication of the success of this event over the years, and it is something we are proud of," said al-Abdulla.Speaking on the occasion, Qatar Golf Association president Hassan Nasser al-Naimi said it is a proud moment for Qatar that the event is being held at a new venue.“Qatar Golf Association and Doha Golf Club are proud to host the 2020 Commercial Bank Qatar Masters at Education City Golf Course. I would like to thank out title sponsors Commercial Bank for their continued sponsorship. Hope we will continue it here for the coming few years," he said. Two of Qatar's most promising players – Saleh al-Kaabi and Ali al-Shehrani – will also rub shoulders with the elite of the European Tour during the event.

ITFF Qatar Open gets underway

Doha, March 04, 2020-The 25th edition of the Qatar Open table tennis began yesterday at the Aspire Dome with qualification matches, as the players battled it out for a place in the World Tour Platinum event.It was Swedish prodigy Truls Moregard who grabbed the spotlight on the opening day as he stunned China's Fang Bo in the men's singles Preliminary first round match. It was all about the fiery shots, with the match going to a seventh game decider. Eventually, Moregard came out on top, winning 4-3 (11-4, 9-11, 11-9, 7-11, 10-12, 11-4, 12-10) in a 54 minutes. “I feel amazing, it was really nice to win this match. We both won some tough game but in the end when I manage to stay calm and make some really good points I won, I'm really happy. It's one of the best win of my career so far," Moregard said.“He is still unbelievably good even though his World Ranking has dropped. I'm just really happy. Before playing in the Japanese league, you have a lot of respect for these players but practising with these top players it helps to make lower that feeling and can play more freely," he added, China's world junior champion Xiang Peng was among the winners yesterday. He was taken the distance against France's Can Akkuzu, before coming through 11-9, 8-11, 11-5, 7-11, 11-3, 13-15, 11-6. Other Chinese winners included Yan An and Zhou Yu who both moved a step closer towards the main draw.Yan beat Indian's Harmeet Desai 11-6, 10-12, 13-11, 11-5, 11-9 and Yu knocked out Romania's Ovidiu Ionescu after recovering from 2-0 down, 8-11, 8-11, 11-1, 11-6, 11-5, 11-3.Qatar suffered disappointment on home soil as Mohamed Abdulwahhab was seen off in straight games by Uzbekistan's Zokhid Kenjaev, 11-4, 11-7, 11-5, 11-6. Fahed Almughanne also lost for the host nation, going down to India's Amalraj Anthony 11-5, 11-3, 11-5, 11-7.Kirill Gerassimenko, who won Kazakhstan's first-ever international men's singles title last month at the ITTF Challenge Spanish Open, needed the full seven games to pull through his opening round meeting. Behind by 0-2 on the scoreboard Gerassimenko showed great courage to mount a fantastic comeback, beating Croatia's Wei Shihao 4-3 (9-11, 3-11, 11-7, 11-7, 11-9, 6-11, 11-8). China's Xu Chenhao accounted for Austria's Stefan Fegerl across five games (11-6, 11-7, 9-11, 11-7, 11-7), while his countryman Zhou Qihao negotiated a tricky encounter against Belarusian opponent Aliaksandr Khanin 4-1 (11-9, 11-7, 10-12, 11-7, 13-11).Elsewhere, Belgium's Martin Allegro outclassed Turkish counterpart Ibrahim Gunduz 4-0 (11-8, 11-9, 15-13, 14-12) with Spain's Alvaro Robles, Hungary's Bence Majoros and Serbia's Aleksandar Karakasevic all prevailing in their respective fixtures.Meanwhile, Russia's Kirill Skachkov and France's Tristan Flore accounted for Iraq's Ameer Al-Nuaimi (11-7, 11-7, 11-5, 11-2) and Hong Kong China's Ng Pak Nam (11-4, 11-6, 11-7, 9-11, 11-9) respectively. Benedikt Duda was in imperious mood against India's Jeet Chandra, as he beat the Asian in straight games (11-3, 11-4, 11-5, 11-7) in under 22 minutes.However, the session was marred by a number of withdrawals due to injury – Czech Republic's Pavel Sirucek and Italy's Leonardo Mutti both dropped out giving Belarussian Pavel Platonov and Senegal's Ibrahima Diaw default entries into the next round.

Stage set for ITTF Qatar Open

DOHA, March 03, 2020-The 25th edition of the Qatar Open will be begin from today, with top table tennis stars in action at the Aspire Dome. The stellar cast will be led by Chinese paddlers Fan Zhendong and Xu Xin, the top two seeds in the men's and women's section respectively. The tournament will be held until March 5-8 event and a staggering $400,000 in prize money in five categories, with the preliminary matches scheduled for today and tomorrow. The Qatar Open is a Platinum Series event on the ITTF World Tour and is the second out of six Platinum Series, as the players fight for points to qualify for the season ending 2020 ITTF World Tour Grand Final from 10-13 December. There are five titles on offer: men's and women's singles, men's and women's doubles and mixed doubles.Reigning women's world champion Liu Shiwen will skip the tournament due to injury, with the Chen Meng, Sun Yingsha, Mima Ito and Wang Manyu the contenders for the title. Shiwen – the 29-year-old former world No 1, a record five-time World Cup title holder, had registered to participate in the women's singles and mixed doubles at the Qatar Open before sustaining an injury on her right elbow. The men's category will see the absence of Timo Boll and Dimitrij Ovtcharov. Amid concerns over the spread of Covid-19 coronavirus in China, the Chinese team has cancelled all competitions, training and activities in China, and a selection of leading Chinese paddlers have stayed Doha for nearly a month after the German Open.Khaleel al-Muhannadi, First Vice-President of the Asian and International Table Tennis Federations (ITTF), said around 300 players representing China, Japan, Germany, Taiwan, France, Italy, Austria, Portugal and Brazil will feature in the tournament .Al-Mohannadi, who is the President of the Qatar and Arab Federations and the Chairman of the Local Organising Committe (LOC) said the championship prize money has been increased from $300,000 to $400,000 and that the mixed doubles segment is an official qualifying competition for the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games. “We, as the LOC, have finished all preparations and arrangements to host the event. We are expecting another great edition of the Qatar Open," he added.The winner of the men's and women's singles competitions will take home $44,000 each while the beaten finalist in both classes gets richer by $22,000. “We wish everyone on this occasion to celebrate the silver jubilee of the Qatar Open. The number of countries participating in 2020 Qatar Open is 53 countries. The players have arrived and we are set to stage six days of non-stop table tennis matches," al-Mohannadi added.Meanwhile, Qatar Table Tennis Association (QTTA) held a series of meetings with ITTF officials and top representatives of regional federations yesterday. “Around 80 officials are present in Qatar, including the ITTF President Thomas Weikert and 44 officials of the Executive Committee of the world body," al-Mohannadi said. He informed that a few countries had pulled out of the main draw citing coronavirus concerns. “We, as the Local Organising Committee, are following up with Qatar's Ministry of Health and other top officials first-hand on the matter. We were fortunate that the first Chinese squad including the world's top seed were in Qatar for a month ago to set up their preparatory camp," al-Mohannadi said.Meanwhile, Thani al-Zarraa, the Director of the National Teams, said there will be a large number of Qatar players participating the tournament in various categories. “Our players are ready to participate in the tournament and we hope that they will represent Qatar in the best manner possible," al-Zarraa said.

Aspire Academy and Qatar Anti-Doping Commission ink partnership deal

​DOHA, March 01, 2020 - Aspire Academy and Qatar Anti-Doping Commission (QADC) jointly signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to organize workshops for Academy staff.Dr. Nasser Ali Al-Anasri, the QADC President signed on behalf of the Qatar Anti-Doping Commission , while Ali Salem Afifa, Director General of Aspire Academy signed on behave of the Academy.The workshops will provide theoretical and practical activities for national teams members and the Academy staff along with administrative and technical bodies and medical staff.Awareness on risk of doping and preventing athletes to use banned doping are the main topics shall be raised out during the workshops.